Maybe This Time
by SiriuslyMarauderObsessed
Summary: JD has been to dozens of high schools, met hundreds of people. He's been sure of what the world is like ever since the day his mother died and left him alone with his alcoholic father, but, maybe, Veronica could change everything he thinks he knows (Heathers, short story)
1. Part 1

If he was forced to be honest, the first time he had seen her, he hadn't really noticed her. She'd been tense, shifting her weight from her heels to her toes, over and over. She was nervous, scared of the people around her, even if the (obviously new) clothes she was wearing made her look like part of the pack. Even then, her outfit a clone of theirs, her makeup painstakingly drawn on, she looked like she was afraid that one of them would wake up, snap out of it and lash out at her. Destroy her. But then again, it was high school. Everyone looked like that.

He'd looked like that before. Maybe not the makeup, but definitely the rest. He'd worn jeans, like everyone else in his grade had done. He'd worn shirts for bands that everyone talked about and he'd never listened to. But still, he'd stood out. Constantly being the new kid, changing high schools every couple of months or so, had definitely not helped, and being the kid without a mom and with the sociopathic semi-famous father hadn't either, but there was something else that made him unable to blend into the chaos around him. He'd stared at himself in the mirror and been unable to pinpoint exactly what it was, or at least, he hadn't been able to admit it to himself.

Still, eventually he'd given up trying, both to figure it out and to hide it, and he'd done the opposite instead. Worn what he liked, clothes he knew would make him stand out, but that he was comfortable in. He'd started wearing his dad's old trench coat, the one he'd worn before they'd started moving so often. His dad didn't like him wearing it but didn't say much about it, so he kept doing it. He learned how to sew by fixing up the holes he sometimes tore in it by accident, or that other people sometimes tore on purpose.

He took a gun to school once. Didn't get it out or anything. There weren't even any bullets in it. But he liked having it with him, even if nobody else knew. It made him feel vulnerable. He didn't feel vulnerable very often, at least not since his mother had died. He felt watched, with was normal for him, but it had taken him until the end of the day to accidentally show it to someone. It was a mistake, he turned in the hallway and crashed into someone, a guy around his age, and his backpack had fallen out of his hand and onto the ground, the gun and some binders sliding out before he could do anything about it. He'd ducked down, grabbed his stuff and gotten out of there fast, and never looked up the see the other person's face. He'd changed schools a couple of days later, but as far as he knew, the boy hadn't told any of the teachers what he'd seen.


	2. Part 2

He'd only been at Westerberg for about a week the first time he actually talked to her. He'd been reading in the cafeteria, against his wishes, when she'd walked in. He knew her name by then, Veronica. Everyone here knew her name. He'd wanted to skip lunch and stay inside one of the classrooms instead, where it was quieter, but the P.E. teacher had been quick to stop him and tell him that was against the rules, so he was stuck there, but he'd gotten there in time to see her friends (or, rather, boss and fellow henchwomen) talk her into something. He'd been too far away to tell exactly what had happened, but from how she'd talked to the other girl, the "unpopular" one in the pink, (which Veronica's face's color had almost matched) he suspected he'd gotten the rough idea. She was walking past his table on the way back to her own, completely immersed in her own thoughts, when he surprised both of them by speaking up.

"You shouldn't have bowed down to the Swatch-dogs and the Diet-Cokeheads. They're gonna crush that girl."

She turned to stare at him, astounded. He wondered when someone outside of the top dogs at the school had last dared speak to her. He also wondered why the hell he'd done it. A few people in nearby tables, silently staring, seemed to be thinking the same thing.

"I'm sorry, what?"

He answered before his mind could catch up with him, as he usually did, for better or, usually, for worse. " _You've_ clearly got a soul. You just have to work harder keeping it clean. We are all born marked for evil." With that, he closed his book, and stood up. He had no lunch to pick up, but he was ready to go, before thinking any more on what he'd just said. He wasn't sure he believed it, especially the last part, but he knew his father would have agreed with it. That is, he would probably have agreed if he'd ever read anything other than a construction manual or a TV guide.

She, however, wasn't done with him. She walked to his table, cornering him. "Okay, don't quote Baudelaire at me and walk away, excuse me." She frowned at him, head tilted slightly to one side, overly hair-sprayed hair managing not to move even as she did. "I didn't catch your name."

He couldn't help smiling at his own answer. "I didn't throw it," he said, over his shoulder, as he walked across the other side of his table and towards the cafeteria doors. Unfortunately, his cool parting moment didn't last long, since he was immediately surrounded before he could leave. Given that it was only two people, he briefly reconsidered his word choice. Looking up at the two hulking lugs next to him, he nodded to himself. Unfortunately, his word choice had been all too apt. Surrounded was right.

A few insults were thrown at him. Nothing memorable. Most were just straight forwardly being called him gay, which he did not mind (and couldn't fully deny,, but that was another story), but mostly, it was just horrifyingly, mind-bogglingly dull. How often had he had to go through this? By now though, he knew the quickest way out of it, and was the one to throw the first punch. He could hear his father laughing in his ear as he did. "Good job there, kiddo." He tried to excuse his actions with the fact that he wasn't really aiming with his fists as much as he was with the hardcover version of Catcher in the Rye he was holding, but it didn't quiet the wheezing, raspy voice in his ears, clear as if his father had been swinging his fists right there next to him. "Detention on your first week. You're growing up to be just like your old man." Someone screamed, but he couldn't tell who it had been, he just knew it hadn't been him. He hadn't gotten hit, at least, not yet. He'd managed to knock at least one of them down though, before teachers had separated them, and dragged him out of the cafeteria, while the jocks had scurried behind some tables, where they'd kept on hurling their (unoriginal) insults. That didn't catch his attention though. Not even the teacher currently yanking his arm nearly out of his socket did. What did surprise him was Veronica. She was staring at him openly, eyes wide and face flushed. There was something in those eyes, something he couldn't make out. He hoped then, strongly, that it wasn't fear. He met her eyes before the cafeteria doors closed behind him, and his were as wide as hers when they did. He hadn't felt hope, or anything like it, for years, but he had then, and he couldn't have explained why, not even to himself.


End file.
